Exercising devices serve two purposes, to strengthen the muscles and to rehabilitate the muscles. Heretofore neck exercising devices generally comprised devices which placed the neck in traction by a series of ropes and pulleys in which the body is used as weight to pull on the neck or weights are placed upon the rope and pulley to pull on the neck. This tends to exercise the neck muscles in one direction only since the weight pulls the neck in a single direction.
The traction devices which utilize weights require extra equipment and a large storage area for the weights. In addition, supervision is needed for use of traction devices since the devices are not readily controllable by the user. For example, if 75 pounds of weight is placed on the pulley and the user's neck is placed on the traction he would be unable to extricate himself from the device if he became tired, exhausted or hurt himself.
To prevent injuries from occuring to the neck, it is necessary for athletes involved in contact sports to strengthen the neck muscles. The most efficient way to strengthen these muscles is to isolate the neck muscles from the rest of the body since the body has a natural tendancy to use the lower torso to move the neck when the neck is placed under a strain. In addition, many athletes receive injuries and must rehabilitate the neck muscles in order to strengthen the muscles to prevent reoccurrence of the injury.